2.4 Possessive forms

Personal names have a possessive form (Saxon genitive), e.g.:

Mary's book (el libro de Mary)

Mr. Johnson's car (El coche del Sr. Johnson)

You will sometime find names that end in s do not have a second s, e.g.:

Charles' brother

Dickens' novels

Nouns for people also have a possessive form, e.g.:

The girl's book (El libro de la chica)

The girls' books (Los libros de las chicas)

My brother's girlfriend (La amiga de mi hermano)

The teachers' room (La sala de los profesores)

We use the possessive form with human organisations, including countries, etc., e.g.:

this company's success (El éxito de esta empresa)

the British Government's attitude (La actitud del gobierno británico)

Spain's commercial partners (Los socios comerciales de España)

the world's biggest problem (El problema más grande del mundo)

We also use the possessive form with some animals, e.g.:

the dog's blanket (La manta del perro)

Formula for making the possessive form:

Take a noun	Add an apostrophe	If the word does not end in –s, add an -s
Mary	Mary'	Mary's
girl	girl'	girl's
girls	girls'	girls'
child	child'	child's
children	children'	children's
James	James'	James'

Exceptions: words ending in –ss, e.g.:

Tess's brother (El hermano de Tess)

the boss's car (El coche del jefe)

We also use this possessive form with periods of time, e.g.:

Have you read today's newspaper? (¿Has leído el periódico de hoy?)

I didn't see last week's match. (No vi el partido de la semana pasada.)

I've got two weeks' holiday. (Tengo dos semanas de vacaciones.)

There is no absolute rule about the use of these forms; here is some guidance:

	Normal	Less usual	Incorrect
Human subject	Mary's book		the book of Mary
the children's toys	the toys of the children
Collective human subject	the council's water policy	the water policy of the council
Spain's destiny	the destiny of Spain
Animal subject	the dog's food1		the food of the dog
inanimate; relation part of	garage door2	the door of the garage	the garage's door
animal or inanimate; relation purpose of or type of	dog food1		food of dogs
wine bottle3			wine's bottle
tennis court			court of tennis
garden tools	tools for the garden		tools of the garden
mountain bike	bike for the mountains
love story	story about love
skin disease	disease of the skin		skin's disease
Inanimate; relation made of, consisting of or made with	orange marmalade
pork chops
olive oil
malt whisky
Abstract	the end of the story	the story's end	the story end
the history of philosophy			philosophy's history

1. Note that the dog's food is la comida del perro; but dog food is comida de perros. 2. Notice that top, bottom, front, back, middle and end usually go with of, e.g.: the top of the window (la parte superior de la ventana) the back of the hall (el fondo de la sala) the ends of the ropes (los extremos de las cuerdas) 3. Notice the difference between a type of container and a container full of something: Type of container Container full of something wine bottle bottle of wine cigarette packet packet of cigarettes beer can can of beer jam jar jar of jam teacup cup of tea soup bowl bowl of soup matchbox box of matches

We bought two bottles of wine. After the meal, we took the wine bottles to the bottle bank. (Compramos dos botellas de vino. Después de la comida, llevamos las botellas de vino al contenedor de vidrio.)

	For a cousin of Tom's, etc., see double genitive. See also proper nouns and nouns that modify other nouns.